Westcoast Childrens Clinic

Programs: Clinical programswestcoast provides mental health services through five specialized programs. Our interventions vary in scope and range, bound by a commitment to meet our clients needs:assessment program:relatives, foster parents, teachers, and social workers may notice when things arent going well for a child but often dont understand why or what can be done to help. Assessment is a process combining psychological testing with practical interventions that help children and their families better understand symptoms and behaviors. In 2016-17, our assessment program served 134 children and youth. Outpatient therapy program:our outpatient therapy program provides long-term individual and family psychotherapy, parent guidance, and clinical case management services. In 2016-17, we provided mobile and clinic-based therapy to 426 children ages 2-21. Catch-21: helping youth out:some adolescents need extra support during their transition to adulthood. Our catch-21 program helped 67 youth make the move from residential treatment to independence in 2016-17. C-change:every night, roughly 100 girls are sold for sex on the streets of oakland. Our c-change program, developed to meet the mental health needs of girls who have been victims of child sex trafficking, has grown from serving 11 youth in 2009 to serving 123 in 2016-17. Stat (screening, stabilization and transition program):our stat program provides 24/7 first response mental health services to children when they are first removed from their homes due to abuse or neglect. We continue to work with them to ease their transition into foster care. We helped stabilize 795 children and youth in 2016-17. Recent accomplishments:national leadershipin 2017, westcoasts executive director, stacey katz, was appointed to the national advisory committee on sex trafficking of children and youth in the united states, which will advise on the development of effective services for trafficked youth. Dr. Katz presented at the white house in 2015 to state and national leaders at the national convening on trafficking and child welfare. Research and disseminationmost children who are trafficked are exploited for at least two years before adults in their life recognize its happening. To improve the early identification of trafficked youth, westcoast developed the commercial sexual exploitation identification tool (cse-it). In 2016, we validated the cse-it, the first of its kind, to ensure that it accurately identifies youth who have clear indicators of exploitation. The tool is being used widely throughout california. Grassroots advocacy and community educationon november 29th, 2016, westcoast childrens clinic hosted a panel of national leaders in the anti-trafficking movement to discuss the ways racism and misogyny drive child sex trafficking in the united states. More than 250 community members attended the event. Westcoast released a series of podcasts from a recording of the event in 2017.

the youth advocate progam provides foster youth perspective to better serve foster youth in alameda county. The program includes a fellowship based on youth development models. The yap fellows are former foster youth up to age of 24 whose work includes panel discussions, child welfare worker trainings, direct youth outreach, development of training materials, survey taking, formal presentations, educating policy makers, and participation in dcfs team decision making meetings. Youth advocate fellows are hired for a two-year fellowship that integrates professional development, employment training and on-the-job experience within the context of the work performed for dcfs.

ssa milieu program - provided basic care and supervision of children integrated with the clinical services.